As the title implies, I am looking for 1-2 members to fill in vacant positions in the Rogue Trader game, Ascension.

Why I am Recruiting:
Our current roster is comprised of 3 of my real life friends. There was a fourth member but due to some unfortunate circumstances and events he took his own life. We feel that it would be best to finish out this game and honor his memory by doing something that he loved. His character has already been accounted for and will be departing for the conflict with Chaos at the Eye of Terror where he meets a tragic, but heroic, end bringing the fight to the enemies of mankind.

Where the Game Starts for You:
Currently, the game is suspended. It will resume after our friend's funeral and we will conclude the prologue. At that point in time the game fast forwards about 3 years and picks up with our intrepid adventurers at the location classified as "Port Wanderer." This brief skip is a perfect time to introduce new characters.

The PC's are serving under a Rogue Trader named Yuri Gregarion. The Gregarion dynasty is at current a relatively powerful entity in the Imperium and carries about business as usual.

While stopping at a distant way point to take a break from the rigors of travelling through the Warp, The Gregarion fleet is engaged and overwhelmed by Chaos raiders. The ship the PC's are aboard is known as The Redeemer and is one of two vessels in the Rogue Trader's personal fleet present at the engagement. It is boarded by the raiders and completely overwhelmed. At present, the other ship is unaccounted for; though it was last seen disengaging.

Having fought off an attack on the Engine Room the PC's have discovered that the ship's plasma drive's are rigged to explode. Sensing that the vessel is stricken, lacking a crew, and going to die anyways, the PC's have elected not to fix the ship but rather to flee. They are currently heading for the bridge to pick up another PC.

Simultaneously, The Redeemer's bridge is raided by daemons and Lord Rogue Trader Gregarion is killed. His killers vacate the bridge and one of PC's "wakes up" up to a scene of terrible carnage. Strangely, there is a man rooting through the corpses looking for something. After a near miss, the character reveals himself as the Lord Rogue Trader's equerry, Senseschal Treylam, and inquires about the fate of the fleet's master.

After learning the truth of the matter he becomes very grave and sets about fulfilling his late master's Will. Having no heirs or family, the Lord Rogue Trader has granted his warrant to the Rogue Trader PC. The rest of the prologue has yet to be played but mainly concerns the PC's escaping to the other ship in the fleet.

I tend to work very closely with the "driving" players in games where there is a lot of freedom. In this one, you own and control a starship. The galaxy is your playground. Apart from the prologue and first chapter the game is relatively unplanned except for major themes, recurring baddies, and special items.

In a sense, you are writing the game by telling me about your characters motivations, desires, personality, and history. Does your character desire wealth? There are plenty of hidden treasures throughout the Koronus Expanse for you to find and exploit. Does your character secretly hate the Imperium? Good, there are also lots of scum to mix it up with. I try not to limit myself and my players by planning things out too stringently.

What I can tell you about the first chapter is that it involves intrigue, assassination attempts, agents of the titanic Administratum, the venerable Space Marines, and the Holy Ordos of the Emperor's Inquisition. Interested?

As I stated earlier you will be joining three other players that I know in real life.

The first player's name is Gage and he plays the Rogue Trader Octavius Umber. As a player, Gage is very fluid yet vivid with his writing and is pretty damn familiar with 40k's lore. A veteran of the DnD 3.5e system and all the Fantasy Flight Warhammer components, he likes to throw in some dark humor every now and again. He is also incredibly skilled at evoking the feeling and spirit of the Warhammer universe.

The second player's name is Jacob and he plays Tychon, the Arch-Militant. This is actually his first time role-playing and he is doing remarkably so far. As a player, his writing is very black and white, much like his character. He also likes to throw in a laugh every now and again and has a bad habit of blasting the s**t out of the bad guy before it can hurt him. (I'm still going to find something that can kill you.)

The third and final player's name is Will and he plays Remi the Explorator. This is not Will's first time role-playing though I am not familiar with what systems he has used beyond Dark Heresy and Rogue Trader. I think he gets serious kudos for picking one of the most specific and lore intensive classes on his first go at Rogue Trader. He has struggled a little bit with the spirit of what a Machine Priest of Mars should be like but he is getting it quickly. His shrewd thinking also adds a little humor for me. In the prologue he grabbed a corpse and threw it over his shoulder, non chalantly, to "interrogate" the cultist. I am a little curious where that one was going...

I have tried to GM several games on this site and have failed tragically. I was young, inexperienced, and not committed. Luckily, I was able to examine myself and figure out why something that I was so passionate about wasn't working. What I concluded was that I needed to enforce regular posting, communicate with my players in any way I can, and make my expectations clear up front.

Apart from present unfortunate circumstances, these things seem to have served me well and I seem to be hitting my rythym.

My GM style is more geared towards the story of an adventure, not the number-crunching side of things. I feel like my players and I will have a much more memorable time if the story is grand or has far reaching consequences than if we just see who can kill the bad guy the fastest.

As a writer I find myself switching up my styles to match the situation. If there is no threat, the writing is fluid and detailed. I want you to see what I see as I see it. I want the world to come to life for you in all its contrast and color. If there is a threat, the writing becomes shorter and less detailed. I don't do this intentionally but it seems to portray the story well. After all, in the heat of combat you won't really care that the man who is about to eviscerate you has a nose ring the size of a baseball.

The last thing I want to say is that when running a story I love to highlight the struggles. The 40k universe is so great to me because it is fun, interesting, and thought provoking. I have yet to encounter a universe so rife with moral grey lines and sacrifice. I try to bring a little of this into every story I write so that while we are playing a game and having fun, maybe we walk with something we can all learn from.

If you have read all of the information above and are still interested, I would love to receive an application from you.

These are the only requirements I have (and you need to meet all of these):

Be able to post at least once in 24 hours when given notice.

Be willing to provide a cell phone number (I communicate with my players through text)

Have some experience with RPG's though not neccessarily Rogue Trader

Be able to write and communicate effectively

Be familiar with all the tags and coding available on this site

Be able to duplicate a formatted post (Combat posts require certain information every time)

Be able to read a X and Y graph (I use these for combat maps)

Be willing to work on "assignments" outside of the game. (Mainly for gaps of time between the chapters)

If you feel you can meet all of these requirements your application need only include a few things:

Character Name & Career

Physical Description

Personality Write Up

Background

How you Come to Join the Story

Most of those are self explanatory. Information for how the PC's enter the first chapter can be found here. I strongly recommend reading the assignment notes to make a story that fits in.

At this point in time I am only allowing the core rulebook.

Cut off for applications is July 30th. After I have made the selections we can work on rolling a full character and I will give you all the specifics and get your information. If everything works in concert, the prologue should be concluding about the time applications are finished. While you are rolling your character the other PC's will be working on their interim assignments.

As a closing, thank you all for taking the time to read this. I look forward to reading some applications and if any of you are hesitant about submitting one feel free to peruse the forum and look at the story so far. It can be located under "Prolgue: Fiery Origins" in the sub-category "The Ship's Log".

If any of you have any questions or just want to chat you can do so in this thread. I will monitor it and respond daily.

Game Description:

Ascension

A Rogue Trader Adventure

In the dark space at the edge of the Imperium countless fortunes await. If you have the will and the audacity to persist in times and places where dark things lurk, the life of a Rogue Trader is for you. Ascension is designed to be an epic Rogue Trader adventure that sees its cast of PC's raised from lowly voidfarers to lords of the stars. In game mechanics, this translates to a journey from level 1 all the way to the very top.

The game is designed in a unique way in that there is a prologue that explains how the Rogue Trader dynasty the PC's are in comes to be, and sets the players off to do what they will. I intend to look very closely at the Rogue Trader's inclinations and desires to craft the remainder of my story. There are a few main plot points but beyond that it is up to the Rogue Trader how to procceed.

Also of note is the fact that the prologue is crafted to introduce both the concepts and in game mechanics that make Rogue Trader so fun. In short, this game is for advanced and new players.

I have trouble with the posting every 24 hours, could squeeze a post possibly to fill that cuota, but they wouldn't be as good. And cell phone, could provide it, but no real reason as I live in another country and I don't think it would be very logical.

For me it would be giving out cell number and missing a day or two due to spending time with family. I'm very interested in your game and like your style but I have three games I'm trying to balance and I don't know if I could give a substantial go of the application process.

Hmmm... I was interested, but a more dungeon-y rogue trader game where the ship is taken away from you just feels like... I dunno. It is kinda missing the point; the other two WH40K RPG's seem to be more that feel. How likely is it that the group will get a ship / crew / some player will be the Rogue Trader, for this game?

If a character joins that is capable of preventing the ship from exploding, would that be helpful??